By Emmanuel Uffot
The banking population in Nigeria may have heaved a sigh of relief as the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, under the close watch of Godwin Emefiele, seems to have heeded their cry over the multiple charges by banks, especially in e-channel transactions and other hidden charges.
The apex bank, in its new guidelines on charges by banks and other financial and non-financial institutions under its license or regulation, just released, discloses a reduction in charges on some transactions like standing orders, Stamp Duty charges (In-Branch), Automated Teller Machine (ATM) maintenance fees, electronic funds transfer, and bulk payments, among others.
The CBN Standing Order for Intra-Bank will be free, as opposed to the N300 in the 2017 guidelines, while bill payment through other E-channels will be subject to negotiation, with a maximum of N500 payable by the sender per beneficiary. Also included in the guidelines is a review of N1, 200 or 0.75 percent for a biller or merchant to pay electronic funds transfer. This transaction has been reviewed downward to a N10 charge for a transaction below N5000. Accordingly, transactions of N5000 to N50, 000 will now attract only N2500 and N50.00 for transactions above N50, 000.
For charges on ATM which had been a subject of concern for many, due to what they termed arbitrary charges on electronic channels, CBN has reduced charges on withdrawals on ATM. Accordingly, withdrawals on other ATM machines have been reduced from N65 to N35 after the third withdrawal within the same month. ATM bill payment has been reduced from N100 to N50 while debit card maintenance fee which is N100 pay month is now scrapped under the new guideline.
Other charges on transactions spelt out in the new guidelines include the reduction of the annual cost of foreign currency denominated cards from $20 to $10. Fees for hardware tokens will now be based on cost recovery with a maximum charge of N2, 500 as against the previous charge of N3, 500. For SMS obligatory alerts on transactions, deposits, withdrawals, fund transfers, and payments, it is now to be based on cost recovery from a maximum of N4.
Also affected by the guidelines is the payment of bills made through e-channels. The fee will now be N500, based on 0.75 percent of the transaction amount, up to a maximum of N1, 200.
In order to ensure compliance, the apex bank has reeled out various types of sanctions for banks that flout the new order on charges. It stipulates a fine of N2 million against financial institutions that breach the provisions of the new guidelines. The fine, according to the CBN, would be for each infraction or as determined by the CBN from time to time.
It states, “Where a bank is found to have wrongfully imposed a particular charge on its customers, the provisions of section (1) above shall apply to the charge on each customer.” Failure to comply with the CBN’s directive in respect of any infraction shall attract a penalty of N2m daily until the directive is complied with or as may be determined by the CBN from time to time”. It also states that banks are required to log every complaint received from their customers into the consumer complaint management system and must generate a unique reference code for each complaint lodged, which must be given to the customer.
The issue of arbitrary bank charges has been a source of concern to customers in Nigeria. Most of the time, some of the charges are unknown to customers; they only go to the bank to make transactions only to realize that their account has been hugely debited.
Cost on Transaction (CoT), charge on current account, ATM maintenance fee, ATM withdrawal and deposit charges, across-the-counter deposit and withdrawal charges on both savings and current accounts, and foreign exchange transaction charges are among the notable charges.
According to the staff of a bank, a bank is not a charity organization. While rendering services, it must also make profits. As a result, banks must charge for services rendered because they are not a manufacturing company that sells its products.He said the charges are not as high as many think. On whether the banks will adhere to the new guidelines on charges from the CBN, he said it is imperative to comply as the apex regulatory bank.
Saviour Udoh, a businessman, is happy with the CBN’s new guidelines. He said, “It is a source of relief given what they have been passing through while doing transactions in banks. Sometimes you just stay and receive debit alerts from banks that are debiting your account for a certain fee. “
It could be recalled that the immediate past Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, had made moves to check banks on charges and poor services to customers which attracted fines. One of them was the ATM debiting customers without any cash coming out. Under Sanusi, any bank that debited a customer without the money reversed the same day attracted a monetary penalty for each day the money was withheld. This development no doubt led to a reduction in incidents of ATM debiting customers.
For many customers, they still want to play the doubting Thomas about whether the banks will comply fully given the fact that some customers do not even care to find out their account balance after each transaction.
